I've got housemaids knees!

We have just recently sanded and varnished 2 floors in the house. One of them we are going to make into a lounge (see my former rant on the subject). OH is being wonderful about it all and being very gracious about having to move aerial cables from one side of the room to another and other technical stuff.

After sanding and putting 2 coats of varnish on the floor, it didn't have that silky feel that I wanted, more liked sandpaper, actually it would have saved me exfoliating my heels in the shower it was so rough (why have I got heels like elephant hide?). So, I got on my hands and knees with a block and some fine sandpaper and sanded the whole flipping thing, then dusted it all off, then varnished it all over again. My poor knees are aging at a rate of knots.

The dust this has all produced is unbelievable. OH says that he doesn't see it, but I do. I have no hairdressing today, so I am going to blitz the place.

I have really enjoyed renovating this house, and we would like to sell it next year and do another one. Actually, I just fancy choosing some new tiles and another kitchen and setting all my things out somewhere different! In my youth I lived in rented accomodation and would change all the furniture round often, when I had exhausted those options I would move house. It was great fun. I once lived in Peckham in South London (SE22) in a block of 1920's flats built round a courtyard. Most of the people in the block were involved in the music industry and we had a great time. I lived in 3 different flats in the block, and although I was skint really enjoyed living there.

I have been lucky enough to live some great places and have loved all of them. I do count my blessings (when I am not raving like a loony!).

Dust, dust and more dust

We have finally got around to finishing some jobs off around the house. We have 2 rooms that have wooden floors, one of them is oak which we laid 3 years ago, promptly covered it in hardboard to protect it (as we still had masses of renovating to do) and didn't take the hardboard off till earlier this year, and the other floor is in the spare room - not sure what the wood is.

Anyway, we decided that this was the week to hire a sander, and sand and varnish the floors. Sounds dead simple, but first you have to empty the rooms!!! Ah a flaw (should that be 'floor'?!) in the plan. The furniture in the spare room is really old and heavy stuff, but it all came out and cluttered up the rest of the upstairs. The sander was duely hired and OH sanded the floors. I went round the room afterwards with a little sander getting all the bits that the big one couldn't do. After the intense noise of the sanding, came the intense smell of the varnish. Both rooms are big and have needed 2 coats of varnish, but at least the spare room is all back in place now and the floors look great. The downstairs room needs another coat and possibility sanding and re-coating as it is not as silky smooth as I would like.

Misty the kitten thought that the 'kitten assault course' we had created for her with all this furniture piled up was fantastic. She also has discovered that if she sits on your shoulder while you are working, she gets a great view of everything - see photo of her on OH's shoulder.

After a week of DIY it was lovely to get back to doing hairdressing this morning. One of the great things about hairdressing is that you get to meet lots of people, and when you are really lucky you get to meet lovely people like my first clients this morning - Maggie and Alan. I hope they don't mind me mentioning their names, but I love going to see them. They are a great laugh and two of the nicest people I have met.